


Facades

by Alliandoalice



Category: 19天 - Old先 | 19 Days - Old Xian
Genre: Angst, M/M, Pain, Relationship Study, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-06
Updated: 2016-04-06
Packaged: 2018-05-31 13:48:15
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,123
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6472450
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Alliandoalice/pseuds/Alliandoalice
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jian Yi is in love with his best friend, and it's killing him from the inside out.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Facades

He hated himself. Even more so, he hated that girl always clinging onto his best friend, her shiny black locks draped around her shoulders. 

Jian Yi was always putting on a facade, smiling and being perverted and annoying, but when Zhan Zhengxi turns away, his face drops and his expression clouds with feelings of inadequacy. He hopes he never sees this side of him.

He had noticed the girl all morning, of course. Those acts of sexual harassment to his friend, they were all done calculatingly, always making sure she was watching. 

'I envy you.‘ 

Those were his real feelings. He seemed to be speaking to himself, rather than the girl next to him. Courage. She had it. Not like him, who could only act upon his gnawing desire when his best friend’s eyes were shut and his breaths came slow and even in time to the ticking of the clock. He still remembers the warmth of his hand, the feel of his slender fingers laced between his- replicating that childhood memory he had locked in his heart. 

Jian Yi’s head felt heavy, burdened by the storm that had made its infectious way through his entire body. He rested his head on the cold concrete wall, tilting it leisurely towards her in an ice cold gaze.

He snatched the letter from her hands and his self loathing grew.

–

The word 'outsider’ when it was spoken by Zhan Zhengxi; it carved through him mercilessly. The guilt, the anxiety of not knowing what to do- he had intercepted it to gain a sense of control over the situation. It had backfired on him of course, holding the letter made him feel a thousand times worse. They just had a math test, but he hadn’t answered a single problem- he was too immersed in his conflicting feelings. 

_Oh, it’s my birthday, _he remembered dully, gazing lifelessly at the leaves whipping through the breeze, blowing his and Zhan Zhengxi’s hair back. No one had remembered of course, nor did he expect anyone to. It wasn’t significant anyway.__

It felt like he was pulling out his own teeth, handing the love letter to Zhan Zhengxi with a cheery smile. It took every ounce of his energy to plaster it on and steel himself to do the right thing.

'Someone put their heart in it, aren’t you even going to take a look?’ He said, turning away. His feelings were the same as hers, after all. _Annoying. _That would be the word Zhan Zhengxi would say if he knew.__

His mask must’ve slipped in that moment, as he slapped the letter onto the desk when his friend didn’t take it. Jian Yi didn’t want to stick around for another second. 

'Hey! Where are you going?’ His best friend called out, as he turned on his heel and was already halfway out the door. He was too tired to rearrange his face back to that cheery expression, that in itself already drained him of all his energy- so he didn’t look back and waved his hand as leisurely as he could.

_Bathroom. _That was always his excuse when he didn’t want Zhan Zhengxi to see this side of him.__

He felt dizzy, the soft strands of grey hair normally tucked behind his ear fell across his face, obscuring his expression. He stumbled into two girls in the corridor, but barely registered it, nausea clawing at him and blurring his vision. He managed to make his way to the window ledge, using his arms to support himself as he hung his head. 

All that bravado and intimidation in order to snatch it from her; if he knew giving someone else’s feelings to the person he was in love with would be this painful he would’ve just preferred she had given it to him herself. 

_I lost._

He hears footsteps behind him, but doesn’t turn around. 'Looks like you’re in a bad mood.’

It’s He Tian, his smirk large and confident. 'Ah, I’m okay.’ He manages, his voice strained and thick around the edges. He Tian reaches out to ruffle his hair. He doesn’t have the strength to protest, and allows himself to be comforted.

'Say, you wanna play basketball?’

— 

Anything was a welcome distraction, really. He embraced it, following He Tian and his mates towards the courts. Zhan Zhengxi had wanted to play too for some reason, and somehow they had ended up on the same team. He hadn’t looked at him once since the incident in the classroom. The good thing about being on the same team was the switching, so he didn’t have to worry about passing the ball to his best friend which he couldn’t even make eye contact with.

Pretending is the first step to believing he was okay. He knew Zhan Zhengxi’s sky blue eyes were on him, looking at him with suspicion. He beamed his brightest smiles, playing against He Tian and his team in a way which he hoped looked natural. 

'It’s your turn! Go beat them.’ Jian Yi said cheerily, avoiding looking at him in the eye as he high fived him. 

And as if his best friend knew that something was up, walked by him and patted his hair, placing his soaked shirt on his head. 'Leave it to me.' 

Jian Yi stopped right in his tracks then, frozen as his senses were engulfed with what he could only describe as Zhan Xixi smell, warm and comforting and making his cheeks slowly burn. These small gestures of affection from the boy, it messed him up from the inside out. Jian Yi slowly grasped at the fabric, mumbling to himself. 

He’d already forgotten what had been bothering him.

 

\-----

The Jian Yi that his best friend knew was always smiling, silly, and made stupid jokes.

He tried his best to never let Zhan Zhengxi in to see the dirty, tainted side of himself. The pitch black feelings of pain, sadness, anger, anxiety and jealousy that overtook him as soon as he was out of his line of sight.

But sometimes his facade slipped- like when he had been caught punching that tree, his knuckles crimson with blood. Luckily he managed to play it off convincingly, and just like a switch, the mask was back on. 

_A repressed memory-_

The world was coming down on him, and everything he had built so far was shattering into a million pieces. He was never supposed to find out. 

Did he like men? _Was he gay? _He didn’t know. He had never even thought about it seriously, let alone put a label on it. It was all supposed to be fun and games, wasn’t it? Why did it have to come to this?__

The mask he had worked so hard to maintain was breaking, tears slipping past his guard as he shook, swallowing his sobs. Jian Yi steeled himself to smile, (that was more of a grimace) to play off his tears, but it was obvious that Zhan Zhengxi wasn’t buying it. He wanted to die. 

There was nothing left to do but to beg pathetically for him to treat him the same.

—

Jian Yi’s walls were up again, and his mouth was sealed shut. He tried his best to act normal, and slowly place a bit of distance between them. Subtle things, like hanging out with some other boys during break, or (attempting to) blow off a request to give a sheet to his best friend. 

_'What are you thinking about?‘_

Zhan Zhengxi just didn’t understand. If he told him the truth, that he was irreversibly, desperately and completely in love with him, there was no way that he’d be allowed to continue staying by his side. 

Jian Yi simply couldn’t afford to lose him, his best friend of over a decade. It’s not like he had any other real friends, or a family to lean on. He could never go back to that pitiful existence before he had felt the warmth of just being by his side. 

He ached. 

— 

When the word he feared being called most fell from her lips, he was suddenly blinded with pure rage and before he knew it he was screaming, sharp pain shooting up his fist. But what had scared him the most was that he knew that she was right.

Jian Yi already knew he was abnormal and disgusting. He knew that he was probably gay. But having it been said aloud by a goddamn stranger basically just confirmed the worst fears he had about himself. He still remembers being roughly thrown at the wall, punched in the face and yelled at after kissing him; the question of 'Do you like men?’ hanging over everything he did no matter how hard he tried to pretend that night never happened. 

'Jian Yi!’

Having his name called out by his best friend snapped him out of his reverie. Suddenly he was overcome with intense guilt at being caught yelling at this sobbing girl, and having him see this side of him. Now Zhan knew for sure what a disgusting human being he was. It was over. 

Slowly he retracted his slightly shaking fist from the wall, breath ragged. He stumbled past him, too ashamed to look at him, sweat running from his face down to his neck. 'Go comfort her.’ He had muttered. Zhan Zhengxi would comfort her, they’d fall in love, then get married and have kids, and she’d give him everything he couldn’t. 

Suddenly his hand is captured in his and his face is buried into his shoulder. Jian Yi stills in disbelief as he feels Zhan Zhengxi hold his hand like he did when they were kids, and squeezes it like he was desperately trying to put the shattered pieces of him back together. 

Something crumples inside him, and he fights the urge to cry.

—

‘Hey. Let’s go.’ Zhan Zhengxi says gently. 'You coming?’ He looks questioningly at him for an answer until Jian Yi remembers who he’s supposed to be. 'Ah yeah.’ He says, his words sticky in his throat. 'Of course.’

_I don’t deserve your kindness. I also don’t deserve the title of your ‘best friend.’ We can’t keep pretending forever. But until then, I just want to stay by your side._

—

If he had to describe Jian Yi, he’d say Jian Yi was a loud person, and cheerful to the point of being obnoxious. Or if he had to describe him in colours, he’d be a brilliant gold, like sunshine, usually found humming to a bright melody. 

But at the same time he wasn’t that at all- he was an oxymoron, a living contradiction. Sometimes he felt like didn’t know his best friend at all- like he had barely scratched the surface of the mystery that was Jian Yi.

The look of pure despair on his face, his usually colourful ambience dulling to muted blues and greys before sinking into inky black. The way he looked at him like he was in agony, tears streaming down his flushed face. He looked desperate. Before he knew it, he was crying too.

—

Zhan Zhengxi liked the peaceful silences, when Jian Yi would nap under the shade of a tree and he would be content just watching over him. A quiet moment with two boys holding sparklers bright under the vast expanse of the star studded sky. He liked the seeing his grateful smile as he hugged him in comfortable silence on the hospital bed, as he thought it was totally worth getting his head smashed in if it meant that his best friend was okay.

But the silences he hated were the ones where Jian Yi was quietly suffering by himself. The ones where Jian Yi would look right through him or not at all. When he would shut him out and give him that guarded smile. Times when he was right next to him but in a place that Zhan Zhengxi couldn’t reach. 

Times like now.

Jian Yi had all intentions of walking right past him after being caught yelling at that girl, and the night before suddenly flashed before Zhan Zhengxi’s eyes. The sight of Jian Yi walking through that door, clearly upset. The one of his best friend running, ignoring his desperate pleas to stop. He remembers being overcome with the crippling fear that he had just lost him forever. 

Almost by instinct, he grabbed his hand and held him like he had wished he did the first time. Zhan Zhengxi felt his best friend sink against his shoulder in unspoken defeat. He held tighter onto Jian Yi’s trembling fingers, wishing, _wishing, _that he could take away his pain.__

_I want to protect you. I promised you that I would._

_I’m sorry I couldn’t. ___

__

__

**Author's Note:**

> hope you liked it, you can find me on my tumblr (alliandoalice.tumblr.com)


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